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This year as part of my 52 challenges for the year, I began a practice that I soon hope to transform into a tradition. Writing letters, old school style with a pen and paper. I’ve been writing one letter each month to my parents and elder brother and his family, who reside back home in India. In fact my habit has got them writing back as well! Continue reading →

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This post is not entirely an original one. In fact it isn’t even mine to begin with. This isn’t my list . One of the many talented contributors to the mail subscription Listserve had written this brilliant piece when they had won the email lottery. I found these tips so basic yet so profound in their impact on our lives that I felt compelled to share it on my blog. So here goes, 10 tips for a better life –

Call your parents once a week and tell them you love them. If not your folks, call someone you love. Never underestimate the power of your voice expressing affection upon someone.

Live below your means and work to save at least 20% of your salary. Set up automatic withdrawals to a separate account. Maximize your retirement contributions. It is never to late to start saving and yes, every penny does count.

Little habits make all the difference in life: Stretch & Touch your toes in the shower every day. Brush your teeth. Put your fork down between bites.

Do something nice for someone once a day. The cumulative effect of random acts of kindness are worth striving towards.

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For this encounter it is worth mentioning that this ride was taken on 31st October in the evening. You’ll see the significance in a bit. Our cabbie friend (a local Chinese descendent from his demeanour) asked if it was pay day, cause a string of passengers had paid with shiny 50 dollar bills! This led to him talking about passengers in the past who paid taxi fares with big bills. Apparently he even had someone who wanted to pay with a 1000 dollar bill!

He spoke in detail about a particular incident involving a passenger who paid for a S$4 taxi fare with a $100 bill. Our cabbie friend mentioned that from the very beginning he felt something wasn’t right about this but proceeded to return the change of S$95 to the passenger.

Unable to shake off the feeling that something was astray the cabbie asked his next passenger to help check if the $100 bill was a counterfeit one. Unfortunately the passenger was a teen who proclaimed that she wasn’t well versed in the art of spotting fake currency.

Our cabbie friend tried his luck with the next passenger, an elderly auntie. Fortunately for him, the auntie was a cashier at a local kopi stall and most certainly qualified to examine the currency note. His nagging feeling was confirmed once the auntie proclaimed that the note was indeed a fake.

Our friend was obviously disheartened on learning this because this meant he lost S$100 that day (the S$95 change and the actual fare of S$5). He called it a day and just headed home to sleep it off and forget the whole thing. Unfortunately there are some things that you just can’t forget.

Today, he still has that fake $100 bill as a reminder to never accept large bills from passengers, especially for small fares. He says the experience was a costly one, but a valuable one.